pretty and good."

"Oh, nonsense, Mrs Smithers! I am very happy here because I think aunt
likes me being companion to her, and dear uncle wouldn't like me to go
away."

"Of course he wouldn't, my dear, bless him! for he's a good, true man,
though he does talk a bit hard sometimes, and every one likes him. See
how good he is to all these Malay folk, who have no call upon him at
all. Oh dear! it will be a hard time for every one when you do go away.
I know I shall about cry my eyes out."

"But I am not going away, Mrs Smithers," said Minnie laughingly.

"Not going away, my dear? No, not this week, nor next week, nor next
year perhaps. But you needn't tell me; it would be against Nature for
you to stop here always. Such a young lady as you can't be allowed to
do as she likes. All the same, though, my dear, I should be glad to see
you go home."

"You would, Mrs Smithers?"

"Yes, my dear, for I don't think it's nice for English womenkind to be
out here amongst these betel-chewing, half-black people, going about in
their cotton and silk plaid sarongs, as they call them, and every man
with one of those nasty ugly krises stuck in his waist. Krises I
suppose they call them because they keep them rolled-up in the creases
of their Scotch kilt things. I often lie in bed of a night feeling
thankful that I have got a good, big, strong husband to take care of me,
bad as he is. For my Joe can fight. Yes, I often feel that we
womenkind aren't safe here."

"Oh, for shame, Mrs Smithers! Who could feel afraid with about three
hundred brave British soldiers to take care of them?"

"I could, miss, and do often. It's all very well to talk, and I know
that if these heathens rose up against us our British Grenadiers would
close up and close up till the last man dropped. But what's the good of
that when we should be left with no one to take care of us? Oh, my
dear! my dear!" said the woman, with a look of horror crossing the big
brown face.

"Mrs Smithers, you must have been upset this week, to talk like that."

"I--I 'ave, my dear; and it's a shame of me to stand here putting such
miserable ideas into your head; but I had a very hard day yesterday, for
my Joe had been extra trying, and I couldn't get a wink of sleep, for
after being so angry with him that I could have hit him, I lay crying
and thinking what a wicked woman I was for half-wishing that he was
dead; for he is my husband, my dear, after all, and--Morning,